Bir Behman village, located in the Bathinda block, has shown the way in waste water management by converting five acres of foul smell emanating from the pond into a site that will clean 21,000 litres of village water daily and supply it to fields for the irrigation purpose.
Deputy Commissioner Diprava Lakra said using the Waste Stabilisation Pond (WSP) technology, waste water of the entire village as well as rainwater would soon find its way into fields after being scientifically treated.
He added that the WSP was the most simple and cheap method of treating waste water in rural areas.
It is extremely efficient and can easily meet the biological oxygen demand threshold and more than 90 per cent suspended solids are removed, the DC added.
The WSP also removes ammonia to an equal extent. These are particularly efficient in removing excreted pathogens in contrast to all other treatment processes requiring a tertiary treatment process such as chlorination to achieve destruction of the bacteria.
Earlier, waste water used to accumulate at this site, which has become marshy.
“Such bad was the condition of the pond that if any animal fell into it, it took a lot of efforts to drag it out alive,” says sarpanch Sandeep Singh.
In September 2017, after the government gave nod to use WSP technology for revamping the pond, villagers worked under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee scheme and took up the mammoth task of cleaning a source of stench in the village, which shares the boundary wall with a government school.
ADC (D) Sakshi Sawhney said having a population of 2,500, the village was now looking forward to the project getting completed soon within next three months.
Besides cleaning environment, giving villagers respite, providing clean water for irrigation and managing village waste, the front portion of the project will be used to construct shops under the rural haat project from where the village panchayat can earn some income and the green strip will be utilised to develop a park with swings and open gym apparatus installed for villagers.
SDO Mahesh Garg, APO Mukhtiar Singh and JE Gurtej Singh, who have been associated with the project since long, said the villagers would get a new lease of life with this project.
